4 A ROUGH TENTATIVE LIMQ@OF THE BIRDS OF INDIA. 
yet gone into the question, should I believe be borne by each 
species, as also what species of each genus I at present accept 
(E. & O. E.), as occurring within the narrower limits above 
indicated. 
Names printed in italics indicate species whose occurrence 
within our limits, or whose validity or distinctness, I disbelieve 
or seriously doubt. 
There are a good many species, of whose validity as species 
in some cases, or as to whose occurrence within our limits in 
others, I am by no means certain. It is not so much that I 
actually disbelieve in these, as that 1 have as yet been unable to 
acquire any certainty in regard to them; these I have printed 
in ordinary type, but I have prefixed to them a note of inter- 
rogation, signifying that I personally do not guarantee them, 
and am not to be quoted as asserting either their validity as 
species, or occurrence within our limits, as the case may be. 
Throughout, the authority that I have quoted, is the giver 
of the specific name, and this being stated, I have deemed it 
unnecessary to cumber the page with the sign (sp.) after every 
name, as recommended in the Code. (§ D. vide 8S. F., V., 377.) 
Generally I may say that I have honestly endeavoured to 
act up strictly to the precepts of the British Association 
Code. 
Pace the editors of the bis (vide 8. F., VII, 521.) I assume 
(there being nothing about this in the Code) that whatever their 
derivations or construction, all generic names are used* as sub- 
stantives, and all specific ones as adjectives, and where the gender 
of the former is ascertainable either by its derivation (e.g. 
Columba), or from the form used (e.g. Perdicula), I have endea- 
youred always to make the latter, if of classical origin, agree, 
except in the case of Linnzan names which Linné printed with 
a capital first letter, and which, so far as I know, I have always 
left intact as regards gender. Whether or no I have done right 
in this, seems quite an open question. The Code is silent here. 
Genders are, however, not always easily ascertainable. Many 
words were used in both genders by the ancients, and have 
continued to be so used, indiscriminately, by naturalists. 
In some cases there is no real difficulty. Thus the word épyc 
enters as the last member of the compound into a great many 
generic names, and writers use these indiscriminately as mas- 
culine and feminine. No doubt, the word was not unfrequently 
SEPA EET IIIA Fs Sy TELS OF ein Yad) pte SP TA ON Fae 
* For instance, the generic name Ochromela is, of course, by derivation a pure 
adjective, but when applied as a generic name, I consider it to be used substan- 
tively pro hac, and to signify “ The black and ochraceous one.” 
Again the specific name rex, in Baleniceps rea, is of course by derivation a 
substantive, but in its capacity of specific appellation, 1 hold it to be used as an 
adjective, and read the name as signifying “he Kingly Whale-head.” 
